Back in the States

"We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started...and know the place for the first time" T.S. Elliot

I found this quote as i looked through books in the Bangalore airport.  It caught my eye and it still sticks with me.  Coming back to the states, caught dead in winter i find myself longing to return to India.  Return to this place where i felt a real connection to something bigger.  Sometimes it helps to leave the places where we find the most inspiration.  In our time away we are able to grow out of the boundaries we set up around ourselves.  Experience new things; break down the old and make a way for the new.  Change is never easy, but it is necessary especially in terms of spiritual growth.  So this quote seems to be saying, break away from the places where you feel the most comfort.  Explore.  In doing so you will inevitably grow because you will learn from the good and the bad, but in the end you shall find yourself back at the start.  And it isn't until you have taken the risks involved in growth and change that you can actually appreciate or actual know this home.  So you will return with new eyes, ready to love, ready to start, ready to end.

Udupi

So we took the overnight bus to Udupi. It ended up not being a sleeper bus like we thought, instead there were just seats that reclined back very far and having long legs made this uncomfortable. Anyway, did sleep well, or at all. I dont no i think it was a combination of the seating and the very loud bollywood movie playing- haha.
We got to Udupi just as i starting to fall asleep- around 6:30 am. We got a rikshaw and headed to the Sri Krishna temple where we stayed, for free, at the guest house. Udupi was such a great town. It was quiet and very nice. I liked the temple so much and really enjoyed chanting my jappa there.
On the second day we took an adventure out to see this guy who was a puppeteer. We thought we were going to a store but instead we arrived at his house where he builds and stores all his puppets. The craft has been in his family for 350 years and it not only perseves a family lineage but it perserves vedic culture. With his puppetts his tells stories like the mahabarata and we had the pleasure of watching a clip of his performance.
Now we are at the ebach in Varkala and wow its so beautiful- its touristy though. There are a lot of people from europe here, so you almost forget that your in India. Regardless, we are enjoying our last few days here, swimmin gon the beach, eating fruit, napping in hammocks, so nice. I think ending the trip this way will make me not want to come home to the cold!